Baseball

HARWICH, Mass.—In its first NCAA tournament game in 37 years, MIT was not able to hold an early lead and fell to Rhode Island College by a 12-2 score. J.P. Stone went 4-for-4 with four runs batted in to help lead the fifth seeded Anchormen over #4 MIT in the opening game of the 2011 NCAA Division III New England Regional Baseball Championship at Whitehouse Field.

With their first loss in the double elimination tournament and a surprising result in the second game, MIT will now play the top seeded Tufts Jumbos in an elimination game at 9:30 Thursday morning. That game can be viewed free online at http://www.d3cast.com/ or the live stats can be followed at http://livestats.prestosports.com/ecac/.

The Engineers (25-14), struck first with two runs in the opening frame on Wednesday morning. Brian Doyle scored on a failed pickoff attempt at second base and Dan Hyatt had an RBI sacrifice fly to score Bryan Macomber, who had doubled to left field.

That was all MIT would get, however, as RIC starting pitcher C.J. Tsomakas (7-2) allowed the two runs, one unearned, over six innings to get the win. Cameron Cash worked three scoreless innings to chalk up his first career save, allowing just two singles. He didn't issue a walk and struck out the last six batters.

Starter Aric Dama (5-2) took the loss for the Engineers after giving up four runs and eight hits in four innings. Doyle, Macomber, Zach Carr, Sean Karson and Jonathan Rea joined Hyatt as Engineers to record a hit.

RIC improves to 22-18 after reaching the 10-hit plateau for the 20th time this season. The Anchormen rapped out 17 hits for their third-highest total on the year. They tied the game at 2 in the top of the third when Kyle Allaire singled down the left field line to plate Stone. Alliare would later score himself on a Mike Giustino double to left field. RIC scored two more in each of the next two innings, then put the game out of reach with six runs in the sixth to wrap up the scoring for both teams.

Justin Corso gave the Anchormen the lead for good with a run-scoring single to right in the fourth.

Every Anchormen in the lineup had at least one hit, including Ronnie Bracchi with a double and Kevin Carey with an RBI-double.